Wednesday, July 18, 2007

Datelie NBC

Chris Hansen and Dateline NBC, the sleazy geniuses behind To Catch A Predator who made pedophilia fun for the entire family as well as lucrative for their corporate masters, don't want you to know the whole story about why their hidden camera hijinx are more about ratings than law enforcement. On the Today show this morning, Hansen claimed that Texas county officials refused to prosecute following NBC's latest extravaganza because of jurisdictional issues. What Hansen didn't mention was this:

Over four days in November, 24 men were arrested at a two-story home in one of Murphy's newer neighborhoods after allegedly arranging to meet boys or girls there.

...

Then, last month, Collin County District Attorney John Roach dropped all charges. He said that in 16 of the cases, he had no jurisdiction, since neither the suspects nor the decoys were in the county during the online chats.

As for the rest of the cases, he said neither police nor NBC could guarantee the chat logs were authentic and complete.

As details of the suicide [of one target] emerged, Murphy's mayor, City Council and most of its residents learned that potential molesters were being lured to their city. Many were furious.

"They can chase predators all they want, but they shouldn't do it in a populated area with children, two blocks from an elementary school, " said Lisa Watson, 33, who lives down the road from the sting house.

It's a fair assumption that Hansen and NBC couldn't guarantee the authenticity of any of the transcripts, but D.A. Roach didn't even look into that issue for the allegations where no jurisdiction existed. But Hansen failed to tell his fans jurisdiction was not the only problem with his home videos. Which isn't surprising since the series was always more about voyeurism (call it Srangers with Candy Camera) than the protection of children.

Fans the of freak show needn't worry, however. Hansen has brought his women with little girl voices to New Jersey for more creepy fun, and MSNBC has enough outtakes, bloopers and practical jokes to keep the thigh-rubbing public drooling for years to come.